The 'Aquapocalypse' gets one of its first songs

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- They're certainly not going to be the only ones, but T.J. King and Kevin Kidd are among the first out of the box with a song about the water crisis. Titled "Aquapocalypse in West Virginia," the song, with added sound clips, was featured on the "Throw Down a Song Thursday" segment Jan. 16 on radio station Electric 102.7.

As of Wednesday, it had earned nearly 8,000 listens on King's Soundcloud page. On Wednesday, they uploaded a YouTube version which can be seen here. And King will also perform the song at tonight's free Third Eye Cabaret at The Cellar, 8 Capitol St., which runs 8 to 10 p.m.

The song takes aim at Freedom Industries' contamination of the water supplies of more than 300,000 people from a leak of Crude MCHM at a tank farm on the Elk River on Jan. 9.

"I couldn't have anticipated," King said. "It's exciting to have all these people hear it and enjoy it. It's a real thrill to me.

"We didn't want it to be political; we just wanted it to be fun," said King, a production director at the station. "The poisoning of the water supply of 300,000 people is no laughing matter, but West Virginians have a good sense of humor. We just wanted to help people get a laugh out of a situation that's not funny. Like I say, laughter is the best medicine between fits of rage."

While they didn't want to make it too political "at the same time, I wanted to sarcastically express frustration," said King of the song, which also includes a not-so tongue-in-cheek legal disclaimer referring to the radio station's parent company.

"The song starts with what actually happened to me and my family when we got the news. We were at Hardings -- we love Hardings, we go there a lot. Our waitress handled it rather well," King noted. "You can imagine having to give someone that news at a restaurant. There was just a lot of confusion at that point."

With the song, "I also wanted to hit all the things everyone went through through the whole process. Like the discovery of the state of emergency to finding out what this chemical was and everyone not knowing what the heck it was, to having to survive without our tap water and then praising all of our people for helping each other out in time of crisis."

At the time of the song, there were still red zones for those who were advised to continue to avoid using their tap water.

"We're still not drinking the water. I'm anxious to see what our lawmakers will do to improve regulations. That's basically where I'm at," said King.